SHOTGUN WEDDING

Name: SHOTGUN WEDDING
Item: SHOTGUN WEDDING
Author: Gaby Gaduh

"Noteworthy Nutty Nuptials"

Content: -2 Extreme caution for older teenagers and adults.

Entertainment Quality:

	None	Light	Moderate	Heavy
Language
Violence
Sex
Nudity

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What You Need To Know:

SHOTGUN WEDDING is a comedy thriller on Amazon Prime. Starring Jennifer Lopez and Josh Duhamel. It tells the harrowing but humorous tale of Darcy and Tom as they prepare for their big wedding bash in the Philippines. Before the wedding starts, the bride and groom contend with some family drama and each other’s personal insecurities. Some pirates invade the upcoming nuptials and hold the wedding party hostage, to extort some ransom money from Darcy’s father. Tom and Darcy awkwardly and humorously spring into action to thwart the dastardly pirates.

SHOTGUN WEDDING has high production values and offers a fun mix of action, romance and comedy. The action sequences are well executed, and the leads are convincing and engaging in their roles. SHOTGUN WEDDING is also consistently funny. It also has a surprisingly positive message on marriage. For example, the bride and groom work together to overcome obstacles, resolve issues, and understand and help each other. However, other couples are not so morally uplifting. SHOTGUN WEDDING also has lots of strong and light obscenities and profanities and strong action violence. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises extreme caution.

Content:

(BBB, Ro, Pa, LLL, VV, SS, M):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Very strong moral worldview with a really positive view of marriage and good fighting evil, but there are some Romantic, pagan, immoral elements

Foul Language:

At least 35 obscenities (including at least 12 “f” words), one GD profanity, many light profanities, and several scatological interjections

Violence:

Lots of strong and light, sometimes intense violence and especially action violence such as a woman slaps a man; a man puts a net over a man’s head, and a woman sprays him in the face with hairspray before they’re knocked to the ground, man’s head is set on fire, a man is thrown to the ground and hits his head on a rock, a woman drops a grenade on two men below, and it explodes, the burned back of a man’s head is shown (reddened skin is shown), a man cuts his hand on a circular saw, and blood splatters on him and a woman; a man fights a female pirate and throws her through a window, a man’s hand is shown with a lot of blood, a man hits another man in the face with a gun (some blood on his face), a man is kicked out of a helicopter, a man and woman attack pirates on a dais, a man bats a live grenade at a pirate, and it explodes on him, lots of gunplay with semi-auto and automatic weapons, a man is drawn into helicopter blades and the helicopter crashes into the sea, and many pirate villains bite the dust

Sex:

Some strong and light sexual content overall includes a scene where a bride asks her groom to fornicate with her just before their wedding, the couple engages in some passionate kissing on a bed until they’re interrupted (her legs and abdomen are exposed), several spouses are unfaithful to each other (despite the positive example of the two romantic leads in most of the movie), multiple unwed persons talk about having sexual relations with other people at the wedding in the movie, and there is some lewd dialogue

Nudity:

No explicit sexual nudity, but a woman’s legs and abdomen are exposed in a protracted scene of her in panties and a half T-shirt, plus there’s some female cleavage

Alcohol Use:

Casual drinking at a wedding

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

A woman briefly smokes a cigarette but no drug use; and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

Pirates hold a wedding party for ransom.

More Detail:

SHOTGUN WEDDING an R-rated comedy thriller on Amazon Prime starring Jennifer Lope, Josh Duhamel, Jennifer Coolidge, and Cheech Marin. It tells the harrowing but humorous tale of Tom and Darcy as they prepare for their big wedding bash in the Philippines. Contending with each other’s personal insecurities and family drama, they are beset by a group of pirates who take the wedding party hostage to extort ransom money from Darcy’s father (Cheech Marin). The soon-to-be-newlyweds spring into action in ways as awkward and unexpected as any non-professional anti-piracy force in their situation would be. Can the bride and groom come together for more than the ceremony and manage to save their wedding guests and themselves from the monetary machinations of a band of pirates, scoundrels and scalawags?

This romantic action comedy has high production values and a surprisingly positive message on marriage. The effective shots of exotic Filipino vistas which are the setting of the groom’s planned fairytale wedding, besides their beauty, contrast strongly with the movie’s real conflict, the unexpected pirate invasion and occupation. Action sequences are well executed with hilarity and no excessive blood or gore. The leads are convincing and engaging in their roles, distinguish themselves as an unlikely hero and heroine couple. They receive plenty of help in livening up the story from supporting cast members such as Cheech Marin playing Darcy’s father, Robert, and Lenny Kravits playing her former fiancée, Sean. SHOTGUN WEDDING is consistently funny. Though it occasionally has the viewer laughing out loud, its power is in the subtler and deeper chuckles it may elicit from anyone who is or has been married to the right person. It’s the story of two ordinary people thrown into an extraordinary situation who come to see that they do love each other despite their personality differences and lack of full understanding. The movie is both enjoyable and relatable, as are the two leads and their characters. It is quite refreshing to see Amazon Studios pull off an effective comedy without recourse to its trademark move of pushing the woke pansexual religion in viewers’ faces. However, the movie does have many strong and light obscenities and profanities, plus some lewd and bawdy dialogue and strong, intense action violence.

SHOTGUN WEDDING’s overall worldview is a mix of biblical morality with Romantic elements. It promotes a surprisingly positive message on the nature and experience of marriage between one man and one woman. As such, it’s a breath of fresh air in the face of postmodern pessimism on the subject. The bride and groom work out their misunderstandings regarding their personality differences in a very real, respectful and heartfelt way, though they do so extemporaneously because of the unexpected nature of the pirate invasion. For example, Darcy comes to see Tom’s desire for a big wedding as an attempt to communicate to her that she is his treasure. Tom comes to see that his obsessing is unnecessary and his insecurity regarding Darcy’s former fiancée is foolish. They also offer something not often seen in films today: a man and wife (the ceremonial part comes later) working together to overcome obstacles, resolve issues, understand and help each other, and functioning in many ways as a husband and wife should. This biblical picture of man and wife, Christ and the Church, is a powerful biblical theme on display. Even Tom’s Romantic notion of love that all he needs in life is Darcy doesn’t erase the movie’s moral, biblical foundation. For this reason, SHOTGUN WEDDING is a diamond in the rough in the romantic comedy genre.

Despite the positive example set by the two romantic leads in SHOTGUN WEDDING, other couples are unfaithful, and other people at the wedding want to sleep together. SHOTGUN WEDDING also has many strong and light obscenities and profanities and lots of intense action violence where many bad guys bite the dust. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises extreme caution.